Training For Life: How To Lose Weight Without Going To The Gym
Hello dear,
You can’t say I don’t take my projects seriously!
After rent and transportation, one of the things that cost most (depending on the person) is a gym membership.
So, I decided to find a way around it.
It took some time and lots of trial and error, but I found a way around it! To prove it to you, I told myself (and everyone I know) in January that I’d lose 30lbs before my 25th birthday… and blog about it!
Today is my 25th birthday, May 23rd, 2017. And I’ve lost 35.5lbs!
To put it in context, that’s the equivalent of almost 3, 12lbs bowling balls, (that I’m not carrying with me anymore). Like these:
That’s pretty heavy.
How? Why? We’ll cover it all in this letter!
Onward.
Sidenote: This is a long letter. You don’t have to read it all. I divided it nicely so you can go straight to what you want. If you want to know which Resources I used, go to that section. The other sections are Diet, Exercise, Extra and FAQ. I wanted something in here for everyone. I repeat, you don’t have to read from top to bottom. Scroll around and stop at whatever piques your interest.
Resources
I cannot write every detail here (otherwise it would take an hour for you to go through it all), but I can show the resources I used and highly recommend.
Here are the top three:
This book introduced me to the slow-carb diet, cheat days, cold exposure, and much more. I love how Tim approaches everything the way a scientist would, which shows why his advice is so effective.
Of course, Tim’s podcast is amazing too (and if you haven’t listened to it yet, you’re missing out). In this book, he distilled the best advice from everyone he interviewed; from celebrities like Jamie Foxx (my favorite episode) or Arnold Schwarzenegger, to less known and yet fascinating people like BJ Miller or Dom D’Agostino (and many, many, many more). For weight-loss, this book introduced me to interesting things like fasting, ketosis, or ursolic acid.
3. FoundMyFitness — Dr. Rhonda Patrick (Podcast/ YouTube Channel)
In a world full of pseudo-science and fad diets, it is hard for a good skeptic to believe in anything we see/ read. Unfortunately, I don’t have the knowledge (or skills) to separate the wheat from the chaff. Fortunately, Dr. Rhonda Patrick does! Her podcast and YouTube channel are a gift to anyone looking to safely improve their health and wellbeing. Her series on time-restricted feeding (and delicious smoothies) were a huge boost to my health.
These are the top three resources I found! I hope you check them out and benefit from their wealth of knowledge.
Now that you know where I got my information, let’s move on to what I did.
Sidenote: These tips worked for me. Your mileage may (and probably will) vary. Talk to a doctor before trying the things I write about.
Diet
I divided my favorite tips into 5 “levels”.
Why? Because it’s easier to remember that way.
Also, it shows you don’t have to do everything to get results (sometimes, I didn’t).
It’s pretty subjective, but I tried to order it from Level 1 (what was most important to me/ easiest) to Level 5 (what was less important and less easy).
However, they’re all effective.
Level 1: Time-restricted feeding
This is near and dear to my heart. This is easier than any diet because you can still eat whatever you’re eating, but just change WHEN you eat (and still lose fat!).
You can learn the equivalent to a master’s degree in this topic by listening to Dr. Rhonda Patrick’s interviews with Dr. Satchin Panda, Ruth Patterson, and Valter Longo.
Put it simply; Food has a relationship to your biological clocks (governed by Circadian rhythm). WHEN you eat is just as important as WHAT you eat.
Why? Because your biological clocks regulate thousands of genes (somewhere around 10–15% of the expressed human genome). If these clocks don’t know what time of day it is, bad things happen.
“People eat the largest meal in the evening. Which is completely counter-productive.
Why do you need all that energy right before you’re about to become completely comatose? It makes no sense.
You need your energy during the day when you’re busy, up, and walking.” — Ruth Patterson, Ph.D.
Think about it this way, when it starts getting dark your body thinks “oh good! Soon we will go to sleep”. But when you eat, you tell your body “DING DING DING! Here’s some more energy! We are waking up! Let’s go go go!”. That messes everything up.
The best thing is for you to eat within 12 hours, and fast for 12 hours. Also, you shouldn’t eat after 7–8pm.
Why? Here are a few reasons:
- In an experiment led by Dr. Satchin Panda, two groups of mice ate the same amount of food, except one group would only eat during a 12-hour window. The mice who only ate for 12 hours saw decreases in fat mass, increases in lean muscle, improvements in glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity, reductions in inflammation, and much more. (P.S. If they only ate for 9 hours, they got all those goodies PLUS an additional enhancement of endurance).
- The data showing that eating late at night disrupts your sleep pattern has been around for a long time. So if you’re not sleeping well at night, try not eating after 7 pm!
- Ruth Patterson and her team studied 2,413 women with breast cancer and showed that those who didn’t eat for 13 hours every day reduced their risk of breast cancer recurrence by 40% (If I was a woman, this data alone would make me fast for 13 hours EVERY DAY). They also believe this dietary pattern could have really positive effects on other diseases and conditions including Type 2 Diabetes, Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD), and Acid Reflux Disease (GERD).
- In Blue Zone Cities (Cities where people live the longest like Okinawa, Loma Linda, Sardinia, etc…) a lot of people say they only eat two meals a day. This reminded me of Tim Ferriss’ recent interview with Art De Vany (ripped at 79), who also said he only eats two meals a day. Maybe “where there’s smoke, there’s fire” when it comes to these healthy older people only eating two meals a day.
So what do I do? I eat for 9 hours and fast for 15 hours.
I start eating at 7 am (when I wake up) and have my last meal at 4 pm.
Anything other than water during your fasting period will break your fast (including coffee).
Level 2: Eat 30 grams of Protein within 30min of Waking up
I got this from Tim’s book, 4-Hour Body.
Eating 30 grams of protein within 30min of waking up tripled the speed at which his father lost weight.
Most importantly, skipping breakfast is closely associated with overeating later in the day. Not recommended!
So, as soon as I wake up I blend a delicious protein shake:
- 1 Scoop of Isopure Low Carb Powder (chocolate flavor, of course)
- 1/2 cup of Quaker Oats Old Fashioned Oatmeal (just for chewiness and deliciousness)
- 2 Tbsp of Hydrolyzed Collagen powder (which has been shown to be good for your cartilage)
Level 3: Meal prep + Slow-carb diet
“The most successful dieters, regardless of whether their goal is muscle gain or fat-loss, eat the same few meals over and over again.” — Tim Ferriss
I always recommend meal prepping for two reasons:
- It is much easier to cook once a week and have it all ready to just heat n’ eat.
- It is much, much cheaper to buy a lot of the same food instead of buying several ingredients for one meal and fill your fridge with leftovers.
What do I eat? I find that’s not as important because different people like different foods. Personally, I follow Tim Ferriss’ Slow-Carb Diet.
But I do have:
- 7 am: Protein Shake
- 10 am: Breakfast (usually eggs, kimchi, and kale)
- 1 pm: Lunch (usually tuna, avocado, and spinach)
- 4 pm: Dinner (usually steak or ground turkey, sauerkraut, and spinach)
Level 4: Cheat day
I avoid sugar and flour for 6 days a week.
Which is easy when Saturday (also known as Faturday), is the day to go CRAZY (chocolate, ice cream, pizza, everything and anything). Although you have to follow a few simple rules (outlined in Tim’s book).
This is more of a mental relief than anything else.
In fact, a good friend of mine happens to be a great athlete. Naturally, I asked him what his diet is like. His answer began with “the first thing I do is take care of my mind, which means I allow myself to have chocolate or ice cream once a week. If your mind isn’t in the right place, you’ll never get your body there.”
I absolutely agree.
Cheat day is my way of “getting my mind in the right place”. Besides, as long as you take 6 steps forward, 1 step backward is not that bad.
Sidenote: Lately though, I have been trying to cut sugar off completely (because there are 1001 health reasons to do so). I haven’t been successful in my attempts thus far, but I’ll keep you updated.
Level 5: Ketosis
Every month, I get into Ketosis for a week. Basically, my blood levels of BHB reach between 0.5 and 3 mmol (as you can see in the picture).
How do I do it? I follow the protocol in Tim’s book “Tools of Titans” (I fast for 24–72hours once a month and eat a diet that consists of 75-80% fat for 5 days).
Why? Here are a few benefits:
- Fat loss
- Potent anti-cancer effects
- Better use of oxygen
- Maintain or increase in strength
And many more things.
Exercise
“I don’t have on-season and off-season training- I’m training for life” — Laird Hamilton
Diet gives 80% of the results as they say. But few things will put you in a better mood than a good workout.
Besides, working out helps release:
- Norepinephrine (which helps reduce stress).
- Dopamine (which increases motivation, drive, focus, concentration, and even libido *wink wink*).
- Serotonin (which improves your mood, sexual desire, appetite, sleep, memory, and learning).
This is why you feel amazing after a great workout!
The problem is, with this blog and building apps, I’m busy enough as it is. I don’t want to spend 1–2 hours working out.
So how do you get all the lifelong benefits of working out without the sucky parts?
Easy. I workout no more than 20min every morning, 7 days a week.
Level 1: Be Active Every Day
I asked an ex-NFL player (ripped at 58) what did he do for long-term fitness. He answered “It all comes down to doing something every day… Weights, in the water, bike, etc… You don’t need to kill yourself, but push it and have fun”.
Naturally, my reply was something along the lines of “every day?! what about rest day?”
His answer “Like Arnold Schwarzenegger said, ‘rest day, where is this rest muscle and how do I train it?’ Listen to your body, but don’t plan for off days”.
This is why I workout 20min every day.
Cost: Free.
Level 2: Walk or Bike
I’ve talked about the benefits of walking and biking before.
Personally, if I can’t workout for any reason, I just go for a 1-hour walk. Yes, 15-min is enough for most of the physical/ mental benefits, but I enjoy listening to podcasts during my walks.
Cost: Free (unless you don’t have a bike).
Level 3: Kettlebell Swings
I won’t go into too many details. Tim did that on his blog post about Tracy Reifkind (who lost 100+lbs with only 2–3 kettlebell workouts per week).
Here it is:
If you want to lose weight fast, you don’t need any fancy gym equipment. All you need is a kettlebell.
Cost: It depends on the weight (the one I use is 44kg and cost $139.95 from Onnit).
Level 4: Bosu Ball
This helps train your balance with pushups and squats (and is a lot of fun!).
Also, it allows me to do an amazing abdominal exercise. The myotatic crunch.
Cost: Bosu Sport Balance Trainer (Used) $62.99
Sidenote: For my abs, I also enjoy P90X’s “Ab Ripper X” exercise. I bought this over 5 years ago, but I still enjoy doing it for fun (and it only takes 17min!). If you can’t find it, my second favorite abdominal workout is Laird Hamilton’s.
Level 5: Calisthenics
I am still a complete noob when it comes to Calisthenics. But I know there’s something good there. The calisthenics athletes are in incredible shape (checkout this guy!).
All I do is pushups, pullups, dips, and squats.
You don’t need to get into calisthenics to lose weight (the diet part + a kettlebell is enough).
But this goes back to doing “something” every day. Calisthenics was my choice (yours could be running, swimming, dancing, yoga, etc…).
I’m still figuring it out (and if you’re a calisthenic athlete/ trainer, I welcome your help).
Cost: $187.56 (for full apartment gym)
- Iron gym workout bar: $23.59
- Dip stand: $57.99
- Parallettes: $105.98
Exercise Summary
The gym closest to me costs $50 a month (that’s $600 a year). This is very expensive (especially if you extrapolate for 10+ years).
My full setup (one kettlebell, parallettes, yoga mat, pullup bar, bosu ball, and dip stand) costs $414.51. And can last a lifetime!
Most importantly, I have no excuse not to go to the gym! The hardest part about getting to the gym is getting to the gym. Many people battle against their willpower every time they want a workout. I don’t have that problem.
My weekly workouts look exactly like this:
- Monday: 100 Kettlebell Swings (4 sets of 25) + 15 myotatic crunch
- Tuesday: [alternate 3 sets] 5 pull-ups and 5 pushups + 50 squats
- Wednesday: Ab Ripper X
- Thursday: [alternate 3 sets] 5 dips and 5 reverse grip pull-ups + 50 squats
- Friday: 100 Kettlebell Swings (4 sets of 25) + 15 myotatic crunch
- Saturday: Ab Ripper X
- Sunday: Walk 20min (which usually ends up in 1 hour since I enjoy it so much)
Extra
Here are a few extra tips you might enjoy.
Incentives
This might seem counter-intuitive, but I know that the information in this letter will make little to no difference to your life unless you have an incentive to lose weight.
You don’t need more information to lose weight (what you’ve read so far is enough). If you haven’t lost weight, what you lack is incentives.
This applies to everything in life. If you haven’t accomplished a goal, finished a project, or done something you know you’re supposed to, it’s simply because you don’t have enough incentives to do so.
“If information were the answer, we’d all be billionaires with perfect abs” — Derek Sivers
This is why I told everyone that on my 25th birthday I was going to post a shirtless photo on my blog. It scared the crap out of me. But it made me reach my goal of losing 30+lbs.
Create incentives, and you’ll achieve all your goals.
Supplements
I don’t find them so necessary for weight loss. But I do love supplements.
For fat-loss, I used Tim’s PAGG formula. You can find detailed information on it online.
I also drink tea (enhanced with Brain Octane) in the morning and coffee (enhanced with MCT powder oil) in the afternoon.
Some other supplements I’m experimenting with:
- Beet Elite before every workout (because drinking beetroot juice prior to exercise makes brains of older adults perform more efficiently and similar to a younger brain).
- Youtheory Turmeric (to reduce inflammation)
- Neptune Krill Oil (for cardiovascular support and because krill oil is awesome)
- Blueberry Concentrate (because blueberry concentrate (30 ml/daily) for 12 weeks increased brain blood flow, brain activation and some parts of working memory in a small trial of older adults compared to placebo).
Sidenote: I cycle all supplements. Which means take supplements for 2 months, then take a 1-week break.
Cold Exposure
Former NASA scientist Ray Cronise found out that our concept of burning calories is all wrong.
Most people think that in order to burn calories, you need to have a sweaty, hot workout.
However, it turns out that when you’re cold, you burn WAY more calories.
So far, all I’ve done is take cold showers here and there.
But soon, I want to finish the Wim Hof Method 10-Week online course. I’ll keep you updated.
Ursolic Acid Spray
The benefits are summarized in this study’s title, “Ursolic acid increases skeletal muscle and brown fat and decreases diet-induced obesity, glucose intolerance and fatty liver disease.”
I bought Patrick Arnold’s Ur-Spray. I can’t tell how effective it is since I haven’t been consistent in its use (and the study showing its benefits lasted 6 weeks).
I’ll keep you updated.
FAQ
1. Couldn’t you have lost weight faster?
Yes. I’ve done so twice before in my life (losing lots of fat in a month).
The problem is, I was never able to keep the weight off (especially since those programs involve 1–2 hours working out and/or lots of weird shakes).
Regaining weight seems to be a common issue with these rapid fat loss programs.
This time, I tried a “slowly but surely” method.
So, it had to fit two criteria.
- It can be done no matter how old you are.
- It can be done virtually every day, whether or not you’re traveling.
The first thing I had to do was eliminate willpower from the equation. I learned this from Scott Adams’ book “How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big”. If you constantly have to use your willpower, someday it will fail.
Secondly, I had to make it easy and effective (I mean c’mon 20min a day?). The kettlebell fits that definition.
Most importantly, it had to be cheap! Since it’s cheaper than a gym membership, it fits in nicely with the Personal Finance series.
2. *Arnold voice* But what about strong bulging biceps and powerful pectorals?
I was asked twice about building big muscles. If that’s your goal, ask yourself “why?”
Unless you’re joining some competition, the best answer is “because I like it”.
Other than that, you have no reason to look like a bodybuilder.
“But women dig the big muscles!”
If you think women like big bodybuilder muscles, I highly recommend you read “A Billion Wicked Thoughts” by Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam.
These two neuroscientists used the internet to study people’s deepest, darkest sexual desires (and some things are mind-blowing/ hilarious but I won’t mention in this family-friendly blog).
You know what they found after looking at more than ten thousand romance novels to determine the most common description of women’s “ideal man”? Here it is.
The seven most frequent words describing the “ideal man’s” masculine features:
- cheekbones
- jaw
- brows
- shoulders
- forehead
- waist
- hips
The seven most common adjectives used to describe the “ideal man’s” masculine features:
- lean
- handsome
- blond
- tanned
- muscular
- masculine
- chiseled
Nowhere in there do you see *Arnold voice* “strong, bulging biceps”.
And that’s it for today!
Phew… That was a lot.
Today, we removed each and every excuse not to lose weight. Even better, we saw how to do it spending little to no money!
All it takes is some good diet principles:
- Time-restricted feeding
- 30g of protein within 30min of waking up
- Meal prep + slow-carb diet
- Cheat day
- Ketosis
And the right exercise principles:
- Be active every day
- Walk or bike
- Kettlebell swings
- Bosu ball
- Calisthenics
I hope this helps.
See you next week (follow the series here to be notified).
Be well.
R
Thanks for reading! 😊If you enjoyed it, test how many times can you hit 👏 in 5 seconds. It’s great cardio for your fingers AND will help other people see the story.You can follow me on Twitter at @richardreeze to find out whenever others just like it come out.📚 Do you like books? If so you might enjoy my latest obsession:
Most Recommended Books.📚
Since I write about finance, legal jargon is obligatory (because the guys in suits made me). Before following any of my advice, read this disclaimer.
